- A couple said they had to share a row with a dead body after a passenger died on their flight.
- One former flight attendant told BI how crew are trained to deal with medical emergencies.
- An airline trade organization has guidelines for dealing with deaths in the air.
Mitchell Ring and Jennifer Colin were heading to Venice when another passenger died on their flight from Melbourne to Doha.
Ring told Australia’s Nine News he spent the last four hours of the 14-hour Qatar Airways flight sharing a row with the woman’s dead body.
After the passenger collapsed in the aisle near their row, Ring said, “They did everything they could, but unfortunately the lady couldn’t be saved, which was pretty heartbreaking to watch.”
“They tried to wheel her up toward business class, but she was quite a large lady and they couldn’t get her through the aisle.”
He added that the flight attendants saw there were two vacant seats in Ring and Colin’s row of four. They then asked Ring to move over and placed the body in the seat where he had been sitting.
Ring said that the cabin crew didn’t offer the couple different seats to move to.
While another passenger in the row behind offered one to his wife, Ring told Nine News he spent the rest of the flight in the same row as the dead body.
He added that he was told to stay seated after the plane landed, as medical crews boarded the plane and removed blankets covering the body.
“Our thoughts are with the family members of the passenger who sadly passed away on board a recent Qatar Airways flight from Melbourne, Australia,” the airline said in a statement.
“The safety and comfort of all our passengers is of paramount importance to us.”
Qatar said it had contacted the affected passengers to address their concerns.
Deaths on airplanes are not unheard of, though they are comparatively rare. A 2013 study found that medical emergencies happen once in every 604 flights. Deaths are even rarer, resulting from 0.3% of such incidents.
How crew are trained to deal with dead passengers
What actually happens when someone dies on a plane? Airlines have protocols in place, and staff are trained to deal with medical emergencies. The International Air Transport Association, an airline trade group, has guidelines for dealing with a death on board.
“We were told to be as compassionate and understanding as possible, especially if the passenger was traveling with people,” Pierre-Yves Monnerville, who spent 17 years as a flight attendant at carriers including British Airways, told Business Insider.
Ideally, he said, there would be an empty row to place the body. In the Qatar Airways case, Monnerville said he suspected that the flight would’ve been very busy.
He said that he was trained to “find a way to make them as inconspicuous as possible.” For example, not putting a blanket over their head and keeping them upright as much as possible.
While Monnerville didn’t deal with a passenger’s death during his time as a flight attendant, he said he used to do first aid with the French Red Cross — where he experienced how difficult it can be to move a body.
“Somebody unconscious already is quite hard to deal with in a regular house, but you can imagine in such a confined space [as a plane],” he told BI.
Monnerville added that it would be an extra challenge on newer planes as the aisles are narrower to fit in more seats.
Qatar Airways said in a Friday statement shared with BBC News that the crew’s handling of the woman’s death was “in line with training and industry standard practice.”
In 2021, a flight attendant went viral on TikTok as she explained procedures if a passenger dies on a plane.
“If they have a heart attack and die, and there is nothing we can do about it, and we can’t start CPR, we are just going to wait until we get to our final destination,” Sheena Marie said.
She also said that, despite a myth of bodies being put in airplane bathrooms, this isn’t possible as a body can’t be safely strapped in.
In the past, some planes even had specific compartments reserved for bodies.
In 2004, Singapore Airlines began operating Airbus A340-500s with a locker that could store a body, which became known as a “corpse cupboard.” The airline retired its A340-500s in 2013.
Under the IATA’s more formal guidelines, the first thing flight crews should do is notify the captain, who should then inform authorities at the destination airport. The deceased should then be moved to a seat with few passengers around.
If the flight is full, the body should be put in its original seat or one that doesn’t obstruct an aisle or exit. “Be aware of the difficulty of the situation for companions and onlookers,” the guidelines say.
The IATA also recommends using a body bag, if available, and zipping it up to the neck or using a blanket. Close the eyes, and secure the body with a seatbelt, it adds.
Other passengers should be disembarked first, while any family members should stay with the body.
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